Done for the upcoming roleplaying game Numenera, from Monte Cook Games. This is one weird game, and I have really enjoyed working on it. It's one of the most original settings I've seen in a while, mixing fantasy and sci-fi with a retro-alien-oddball sensibility.

It's fiction, man. In much of sci-fi "nano" and "micro" and such terms are often just loose buzzword-like descriptors for things. The same is true in real life, e.g. iPod Nano, Tata Nano, GNU Nano, BBC Micro, Micro-USB, etc. None of those things are "nano" or "micro" in terms of scale, but that doesn't matter, it's just marketing.

I suppose the Numenera writers could have some rationale for using the term nano, like "the particles emitted in this forceblast are charged nano-scale bits of molecular metals" or some such hooey.

But again, it doesn't matter. As with all such interactive fiction, the value isn't in the fiction's accordance with literal definitions of words, but in the flavor it adds to whatever tales you & your friends might make up. It's just jargony filler.

The term Nano is referring to one of the character class's in the game, which specializes in the use of a combination of nano-technologies and tech artifacts to create powers and effects that seem fantastical or even magical to most people in the primitive world of Numenera. Its a post apocalyptic world with several ages worth of lost knowledge, so these kinds of technologies are common, even if the understanding of how they function is not. Essentially, this is the class most like a magic user or Mage in more traditional rpg's. So you could say that "Nano" is simply short for "Nano technology and artifact specialist", which is kind of a mouthful.

It is an amazing looking product, and even before I was working on it myself, I liked the idea so much that I was also a backer Looking forward to the new Torment game, my favorite era of rpg's are coming back!